Artistic Practice Residency – Hope Haven
Artist Opportunity
Over the last six months Everyone Here have been working with Hope Haven staff to develop ideas for a creative programme that runs as part of their service on an ongoing basis. On December 10th 2025, Everyone Here worked alongside the Hope Haven operations and clinical teams to develop an artist’s brief for an initial pilot commission to support people to experience art in their encounters with the service.
Our shared ambition is to foster creative opportunities and experiences, with Cumbrian artists and Everyone Here working closely alongside Hope Haven communities.
We invite a Cumbrian artist to work alongside the Hope Haven Team and Everyone Here to embed their creative practice into the day to day experience of the Hope Haven community. Initially, the work will be sessional, focusing on developing creative ideas such as:
- A Hope Haven arts residency or studio*
- A “creative corner” at the Senhouse Centre* and, in the future, at the permanent Hope Haven hub on King Street*
- Encouraging curiosity and engagement (“What is that?”, “That’s slightly unusual”, “What’s happening?”)
*whilst the project is at the Senhouse Centre the studio/ creative corner will need to be dismantled after each session.
The artist will make their work alongside the HH service, they will not deliver workshops directly to people but will be open for community members and staff to come and interact with them through conversations and observations. This may lead to practical participation but it doesn’t have to, we are much more interested in artists being present in the service.
We will offer a payment of £45 per hour or £300 per day for you to work on your practice within the temporary Hope Haven site. As part of this residency we would expect you to openly engage with people and talk to them about your art form, your experiences as an artist and any other creative conversations. We would expect artists to do between 3 and 7 hours a week for 10 weeks.
At the end of each residency day you will share your insights and conversations with Everyone Here and begin to think about how your experiences can help us to shape the next phase of our work with the community at Hope Haven.
Initially we would like to receive video or documents that evidence your experience and interest in this call out, detailing the kind of artistic practice you would like to work on in the Senhouse Centre over a period of two to twelve weeks. Imagine that you have the corner of a room, a landing, an office space, how could your creative practice fit into this space temporarily, safely and openly? We might appoint a number of artists and will be making final decisions alongside the Hope Haven community. Please send your applications to joanna@everyonehere.org up until the 28th January 2026, with the first interviews being on the 2nd February 2026. Further interviews at future dates may be arranged as needed. We will contact people on a rolling basis for further conversations, and this will happen before the deadline.
Support and Training
Artists will receive ongoing collaborative support from Everyone Here’s Artistic and Community Directors. The Hope Haven mental health “team of the day” will always be available to assist if an adult requires additional support.
Further Notes on Organisations
Hope Haven is a mental health and wellbeing support service based in Whitehaven and the Copeland area, offering personalised, one-to-one support and activities for all adults with no referral required. Learn more at https://wcmhp.org.uk/hope-haven/
The permanent hub will be located at 40 King Street, Whitehaven, CA28 7JN.
While this site is not yet open, walk-in support is currently available at the Senhouse Centre in Whitehaven, this is where our first project will be based.
Everyone Here is a community led arts project based in Whitehaven and they are the lead Creative Organisation for Hope Haven.
